News
Canadian unemployment up
Employment data recently released for both the UK and Canada shows some similarities due to the global economic slowdown but far greater instability in the UK figures.
In the UK, an announcement this morning revealed that the unemployment rate rose to 6.0 per cent, a 0.5 per cent increase on the previous year and 0.4 per cent on the previous quarter. The figures show that the number of people now listed as unemployed has reached 1.82 million, a rise of 140,000 on the previous quarter and 182,000 over the previous year. The rise in unemployment is the highest since 1997.
In Canada, the unemployment rate rose again in November by 0.1 per cent to 6.3 per cent. The biggest rises in unemployment were in Ontario and Nova Scotia, which saw 66,000 and 4,400 fewer jobs, respectively.
Ontario's large number of job losses was blamed on the bad performance of the manufacturing industry, which has been hit hard by the global recession. Cuts in manufacturing jobs totalled 42,000 in Ontario in November. Other Canadian provinces fared better in November, with more stable figures.
Employment in Canada had initially risen in the first 11 months of 2008, before a sharp drop in November. Employment had risen by 133,000, or 0.8 per cent, before the drop of 71,000. The figures were split across full and part-time work.
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18 December 2008